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So you think we need to drill off the California coast. _ A headline in yesterday’s paper caught my eye: “Pelosi vows to block offshore drilling.” We, as in you and me and everyone, need to think about this; the energy problem, and what we will not do to fend it off, as well as what we will do. _ Prior to commencing, I want to insert a prefatory notion. The only reason there are US forces in Iraq, the only reason any bled and perished, is because the region is suffuse with oil. So, whoever bled and died there, whether a member of the American military or an innocent Iraqi, was because of oil. Thus, the energy issue is a deadly serious issue. _ _ I grew up in a suburb of Detroit; an urban realm with much ugliness about it, and precious little that might be esteemed to approach lovely. (Ever seen orange snow? I have. What about black snow? I’ve seen that too.) _ One area, however, stands out as a genuine gem: the H.C.M.A. (Huron-Clinton Metropolitan Authority. http://www.metroparks.com) collection of public parks, all built around the Huron and Clinton Rivers that course through some of Southeast Michigan’s last rolling, wooded terrain. There are asphalt walking paths that meander through sylvan glens that seem to call back to a time that predates Henry Ford and Horace Dodge and the nearly complete desecration of a godly handiwork. It’s a spiritual thing, one you cannot get sitting on any pew, no matter how hard you try or how long you sit. _ As the state has done with almost all its inland lakes, I can imagine that some would prefer to see Kensington or Lower Huron metro-parks privatized; gated communities complete with towering office buildings and sprawling malls and perhaps a Hooters or two . . . for the jocks guzzling down beer after beer through football-studded Sunday afternoons. Of course, they can’t do that now. There’s no money. The state is an economic dead zone. But if it weren’t . . . _ I can imagine there are those who wouldn’t give a damn, one way or the other if HCMA were converted to what they’d claim was a higher use of the land. Their blindness wouldn’t blink if the bottom of the Grand Canyon got overrun with oil drilling equipment and structures. They have no soul, or at least a sense of one. _ For, unless it’s some form of mind-numbing entertainment on television or at one of the local mega-plexes, it doesn’t move them. Nothing really human does. Such are the “hollow men” that T. S. Elliott waxed tragic about.
An "Old Army Vet" and liberal, qua liberal, with a passion for open inquiry in a neverending quest for truth unpoisoned by religious superstitions. Per Voltaire: "He who can lead you to believe an absurdity can lead you to commit an atrocity."
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